The distance is what makes it so hardTo be here, so far away from your sideTo be here, as if snared in the liesThat you miss me as I long for times gone by.

To know what I had… To let it all go...Your smile, your laugh and your touchTo know they are gone, never to returnIt tears me asunder, it saps my soul...

The realization is what makes it so hardTo know that you were never mineI could have had it, but I couldn’t graspIt slipped my fingers, how could I be that blind?!

The shadows are what make it so hardTo let go of your memory and bury you in the pastI feel it clawing at me, it is screaming so loudIt won´t let me forget and it brings me down under its weightAs I measure this sadness in pounds My failure streches on for milesAnd liters of tears flow from my eyesIf only I could purge these hours from time...

And it is there, as it has been since the first dayThe emptiness, the silence, the spaceAs time ebbs away, and life goes onMine came to an endThe moment I let you go.

I edited this poem so much that I think it deserves a re-release, hopefully its better than the original version! I´m thinking of unlisting the originals just to not spam my stream with what is basically, the same poem over and over again, but we´ll see what happens

To what her words were softly spoken,Weren’t they heard from the pulling ceiling?It had no way to carry her softly upon shaken ground he held onto what she last felt then,past his hearing the searing heart reveled In the last whimper of sadnessGone was her feelingtears had dripped over her face.. ..Fallen from his grasp the black veil blew upward he witnessed the blinds closing, her eyes watching Overheard with great loudness she was deafSilence hurried the rush toward the floors liberation a sunlit evening wilted dry in prosperity..In a timely fashion she was not heard anymore nor seenThe extraordinary pain I couldn’t understand thenIf only.. She no longer knows where to go..She’s gone unnoticed..I can’t feel her presence anymore yes, we’ll see another once againFrom a pain stricken moment Left in vespertine Along those painless places Where all that lingers high above the ambience Will be your very childlike presence Shown upon in your own exuberant smileThenceforth into tomorrow Farewell till then

I have but one thing to say, please be kind to others as you would like others to be toward you.And another thing, leap forward out of your comfort zone to help someone from leaping off the marked ledge of ‘enough’. It happens too often and I could say I know the reasons why, for others for their sake if only I could take on their pain. complicated is life huh.

—seeing her fall through hopelessly murmuring what would be her final words to the man striving to hold onto her pleading for her to stay within his grasp, she simply didn’t want to hold on anymore, tired by life’s hard trials. So am I. isn’t everyone

I can feel them on my skin. I feel their electricity, so powerfully pleasing, pulling me in. Every glance, makes my stomach dance.The longer it lingers, I ache for her fingers laced between mine.Because,it's only in those moments that things seem fine.

Do you understandAll of this is your faultVindication is all that I wantExcept you’re still on my mindFilling my head in every space for thoughtsUnexpectedly is how this startedCuriosity sparked an interestKilling me as it lingersImplicating me in guiltNothing can cure this conscious of mineGoing down with every thoughtSuspiciously I clear my mindPencils and pens create my thoughtsIllustrated with curves that turn to lettersVariety that turns to wordsEvery one has a meaning and placeYet I let them remain nameless

It doesn’t matter how much I want to changeI won’t changedIt doesn’t matter how much I pledge myself to changedIt still won’t happenedBecause this is the way I was madeI want to do better I want to be better than thisBut I just ******* can’tWho even I amI’m no one And I don’t care if people start saying“Oh, honey don’t say that, you are too young I’m sure there’s some one out there that loves you”Yeah, you are right, my mom loves meAlso, my brothers and my sister, let’s not forget about my two best friendsAnd of course, my grandmotherBut still who I’m I?No oneYes, no oneI’m someone who doesn’t tolerate suicide, but still think about doing it when something wrongs happenedBecause I’m weakVery weakI’m a foolAn imbecileA no oneWho wishes to just disappear But not by my own hand, because I’m to scared to do itBut I’m also scared of dying in a different wayHa! Such a fool.

For to colour a heart's blank pagesrapt in the poesy a joyous ecstasy .., enrapture with rainbow's luscious taste

What seems lost is but a tender vestige unfounda passing moments innocence lostto steal away like rumors of gold

These silent reveries seep from a hole in my heart, as if ripe strawberries of yore, gently weeping sweetnesswhen pricked by a thorny rose

The ides of spring do still bleed a timeless acheonto the page ... sweet naivety stung by a mesmerizing dart to the heart

Songbirds in your garden do singof sweetest things immersed in nature's nectar blissful memories sleeping in the petals of a rose

Sung to the wind by a song sparrow — ♪ ♫...✩ ☼✩ ✩☺✩

If only now in dreams of yorea sky full of stars shine brighter,a garden of flowers fragrance more pungent,and songbirds in your garden from yesteryear sing tantalizingly more beautiful ...,when you were near

it's how he's gentle, drawing me close when I shiver; how he holds my hands, cold fingers nestled in the warmth of his palms.how we return to a certain forest, admiring trees flushed in hues of gold and scarlet; how reality fades away as we walk,drowned out by the bubbling of a stream.how I adore his honeyed voice, soothing like the patter of rain on backseat windows; how the taste of coffee lingers on his lips when he presses them to mine so softly, so bittersweet. how I feel myself falling, but I still run into his arms because"it'll be different this time."

She invites me in with a therapist smileas I step through her doorobserves me with that deep blue gazeleaving me longing for morebegs me to followas she moves across the floorshe lingers slightly with her touchas she gently squeezes my handbut it’s the warmth of her hug that I wonder where does she begin and I end?

Truth is bitter with her scent so sweetshe doesn’t love me out loudin this lifetime it’s just not meant to beher love isn’t realall images in my mind of what I long to feelwe’re not loversand we’ll never be friendsbut I’ll love her in breathless whispersas the depth of my love for her has no end

With each passing year,In the wee hours of Ever diminishing time snatches,The hours between midnight and rising,

Shrinkage, once six, now four hours,Meant for body restoration, Transpositional for poetic creation,Only one body notes the new mark,The digital, numerical clock ofTrillion hour sleep deficit, most taxing.

Al, you ask me from where do the words come:

Each of the five senses compete,Pick me, Pick me, they shout,

The eyes see the tall grassesFraming the ferry's to and fro life.Waving bye bye to theEnd of day harbor activities,Putting your babies to sleep.

The tongue tastes the coolingItalian prosecco merging victoriouslyWith its ally, the modestly warming rays Of a September setting sun, finally declaring, without stuttering,Peace on Earth.

The odoriferous bay breezes,A new for that second only smell,But yet, very old bartender's recipe, Salt, cooking oil, barbecue sauce, gasolineAnd the winning new ingredient, freshly minted, Stacked in ascending circumference order, onion rings.

These four senses all recombinant,On the cheek, on the tongue,Wafting, tickling, blasting, visioningMerging into a single touchThat my pointer finger, by force majeure,Declares, here, poem aborning!Contract with this moment, now satisfied!

Al, what you did not ask was this:With each passing poem,I am lessened within, expurgated,In a sense part of me, expunged,Part of me, passing too, Every poems birth diminishes me.__________(this poem more than most,for its birth celebrates my loss, your loss,which cannot be exonerated 8/7/18)

Pain still lingersFeels like I'm about to breakStanding here achesNot sure how much more I can fakePut me outWipe my tears when they fallGive me some hydromorph'sSwallowing handfuls of pillsNot sure if it's all in my headMy back is full of sharp objectsEven sitting is excruciating Just give me a breakI need some time aloneJust being alive is painNobody to phoneEven though I try toNobody picks upI'm on my ownNever aloneJust dead on the other endAll hope is gone

i'm taking in your scent that still lingers against my handsbefore i go to sleep,to remind me one last time of the day i had with you,and to pretend you're here whispering goodnightwith soft protective arms wrapped around me.

Is living all about fighting to make earthly gains while all the same fearing death? Given the chance, what would be the greatest gain you would make in life?Would the river sweep that after you were gone?How many of the people you know seize the passing time and bless it with meaning? Meaning is that which the river can’t sweep away.

The topic being life and death, I couldn’t help making mythological allusions to bring some univesality to the poem. In Greek mythology, River Styx separates the realm of the living from that of the dead. If you are able to wade across River Styx by yourself, it may also mean you have carried your mortal flesh across time. Does this make you an immortal in a way?

There are two sorts of crossings of the River Styx: catabasis versus necromancy, the former being crossing it before death and the latter after. Well, I know of three figures in Greek mythology who have done it; Odysseus, Orpheus and Heracles. Orpheus, as tragedy would have it, dies seconds after he exits back from the entrance of the underworld. But, with the ‘gesture’ he has made -to descend to the depths of the world and claim back the woman he loved- he earned his place amongst the stars to look up to.

The river represents the grim hands of fate to me, and it must take a lot of pain, strength and bravery to wade or swim across it. How many important people in history have made this crossing? How would you describe them?

I love how Ernest Hemingway coins the might of human life before mortality: “Man can be destroyed but not defeated.” And what I suss out from this is men, if they deliberate and thus manage to take fate into their hands, are stellar beings like gods. Or in the least regard, if not us, some of our feats are godly: a star guised rhyme they will always be.

Fortune in life is fickle and summer time is not to be trusted to last long. Niobe, let's take for example, is the daughter of Tantalus, a son of Zeus born to a nymph. She has these six sons and daughters; all beautiful lads and lasses. As fate would have it, Niobe boasts about the superiority of her siblings to those of Leto: Apollo and Artemis fathered by Zeus. Oops! Leave Zeus alone, Leto is already the granddaughter of the titans Uranus (Sky) and Gaea (Earth), and she is enraged at this outrageous presumption of a god descendent mortal, so she commissions Apollo and Artemis, who are -along with their many other skills- supreme deities in the art of hunt with bow and quiver, to go hunt these six hapless sons and six ill-fated daughters of Niobe in front of her eyes. So is the gory deed done. Grief stricken, Niobe weeps and mourns herself to stone on Mount Sipylus. Today, this place is on Yamanlar Dağı, northwest of Izmir, Turkey. Summer didn't last pretty much for Niobe....

Well, the thematic relevance of this motif is that not only humans but also titans could not escape the grim hands of fate even in the summer of their time. In fact, gods were no exception. The Moirae (Norns or Fates) spun, measured and cut thread for all.

Yet, if not how long, one may at least determine how beautiful the lent time will be. ‘Memento mori’ so let’s ‘carpe diem!’

In Assyrian mythology, too, Gilgmesh travels across the river to ask immortality from Utanapishtim. So the river image in the poem is an instrumental image of death juxtaposing both those who succumb to ill fate and the fighters taking a stand in the face of peril.

There is allusion to Norse mythology in the poem as well. There is reference to the sacrifice deity Tyr makes to keep away Ragnarok, doomsday. Loki's son Fenrir, an ever growing ferocious wolf, has to be tethered to lag his growing; otherwise he will be big enough to devour the entire world, Midgard. Alas, there is no powerful enough chain to do it. In the end, some dwarves fashion it from six mysterious items: The sound of a cat's footfall, the beard of a woman, the roots of a mountain, the sinews of a bear, the breath of a fish and the spittle of a bird. They call it Gleipnir (Old Norse 'open one'). As seen in the list, it is impossible to make this chain. Aren't there some people undertaking the mission impossible to defy the grim hands of fate?

Well, the chain is ready and the Gods have to dupe Fenrir to let them bind him with it as part of a game. Tyr has to place his hand in the mouth of Fenrir for surety that the gods will take the chain back from the sly wolf's neck. However, this is not the gods' plan, so Fenrir snaps off Tyr's hand from his arm as soon as he understands he has been duped. Aren't there those wonderful people around who wouldn't hesitate to give an arm for a good cause to happen?

Charon, the Ferryman in Greek mythology, rows across only the dead. And the dead may see they failed to see all the answers, yet it may be too late... Why not be skeptical and pursue meaning when alive?

We have the tendency to imagine the great people who have passed away inhabiting the stars, or becoming a star indeed. We are wont to attributing this eternity to them. Is it because we love them and we can't bear the pain of acknowledging their departure, or is it because the good deeds they have done during their lifetime has gratified both their and our lives and we can't let this meaning slip through our fingers and we tend to hitch their memory to stars: those twinkling jewels and beacons to the good and happiness in the dark of the night? Yep, do we do this out of love or admiration?

"Some die on the pyre yet live on the lyre." This line draws on the importance of both the ancient and medieval bards in perpetuating the battle glory of knights with the lyrics they wrote, played and sang on the lyre. Yes, heroes who died in battle were sent to their last journey on the flames of a pyre, yet their fame was perpetuated and it did glow like stars.

One thing for sure, we live to die, but beautifully at that, which is only possible with meaningful deeds. And we associate stars mainly with three concepts: eternity, godliness and meaning... Watch out the last item of the list of three; it may bestow upon your life a godly quality and make you a flickering star. To shine, we need a good scraping and rubbing; these are both the toils and tribulations of life we have to bear and how we employ our strength to fight them.

But if you wrap me in a blanketand place me in your armsunder a midnight skyI will always see your loving facestaring back at mineAnd I will reach for your cheekhoping to graze it one last timebut those hopes could never be mine

Because like the dawning of the dayand the warming of the airthe darkest places in our hearts will always see the lightAnd with that light I will know that